[QUOTE=WhyNot]
I haven’t given special meals much thought, but frankly, no, I don’t think I would support that, if such a church existed and had that as an actual tenant. But remember that the government is not required to provide accommodation for any and all religious requirements, but only those which are (much like ADA regs) possible to provide for with reasonable accommodation. What’s that mean? I’m not sure who decides, probably the warden or whomever watches the budget. If he can budget an extra 30% for half a dozen kosher meals, then that’s probably reasonable. 6000% more for fillet is not so reasonable. The rights of the other prisoners to adequate food (not to mention personal safety issues when they smell fillet and have to eat slop) can and would take precedence.
I’m sure members of the Church of Satan are not allowed to hold full Black Mass in prison, nor Wiccans carry an 11 inch athame (dagger) or Catholics to keep lighters and frankincense in their cells. Such things are not reasonably accommodatable while preserving the safety of the other prisoners and staff. Their right to personal safety is more important than the religious expression of the minority.
As the article says, the “1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act…says the government needs to justify any action that would substantially burden people from practicing their faith.” Justify. They *can *burden people, but it has to be justifiable to a judge. I think your examples (and the others I gave), would be justifiable, at least in a special case like a prison, but IANAL.
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It actually was a real case, btw - though I don’t know if I have the name of the Church right.
RFRA was declared at least partly unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in City of Boerne v. Flores. This is what is confusing me about this case. There is RFRA II, which attempted to be more circumspect, and applies to places such as prisons. They are a response to Smith v Employment Division, which allowed restrictions on religious practice as long as they were general - you could not target a particular religious practice. The only time I believe that legislation has been overturned because it was seen as a sham to attack a particular religion was in Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. Hialeah, where a Florida law against some form of method of killing animals was overturned as it was pretty clear it existed only to hinder the practice of Santaria.
The problem with Employment Division (where Scalia said you can deny unemployment benefits to someone who takes drugs for religious reasons, as the restriction on taking drugs is a general one), apart from the fact that, IMHO, it flies in the face of Sherbert v Verner (not that that is a great decision either from a coherency viewpoint), is that it inherently prefers the majority religion. By removing protection from all religious practice, it may appear to be fair handed (and was attacked by the religious right pretty heavily - I have heard it said that it cost Fat Tony the chance to become Chief Justice). But the problem is, no one is going to support a ban on communion wine, for example, because Christianity is the majoritarian religion. What it allows is generally applicable laws, such as restrictions on slaughterhouses, which affect minority religions to a much greater degree. And the purpose of the First Amendment’s religious protections, I’d argue, were to protect minority religions from government interference - the majority ones don’t need that help.
On the prison stuff, you are pretty much right. But there is a consideration of whether the belief is truly held. I believe the test is as follows: the court may not look as to the credibility of the belief, but they can look as to how much the person follows it. I know I came across some asylum cases where a supposed convert to Christianity from Islam (similar to the case I handled) had the degree of his beliefs challenged by an accusation that he still refused to eat pork/drink alcohol. The argument against this, of course, was that it was a cultural factor not a religous one… Anyway, courts can and do look to sincerity of belief.
Prisoners have a lot of free time, and access to law books. Supposedly inventing religions is one of the fun things people do to fill their time. The balancing test that is used is the cost to the prison against the effect on the person of not satisfying the religious “need.” Now, clearly forcing a devout Muslim to eat non-Halal food is a pretty major cost. Safety issues play very large in this as well, as you rightly say. However, it is necessary to look to see how important the belief is to the person to determine on which side of the balancing test to come down.
It does leave a horrible taste in the mouth, I agree - I don’t like the government determining what is a religion or who is religious. I’m not sure there is a clean solution to this - my gut tells me that they should protect freedom of belief, and that practice is not protected at all, but that leads to huge issues on what practice is actually necessary for belief.